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But Microsoft is betting that new security enhancements planned for later this year could make renting music, rather than owning it, more attractive to consumers.

I don’t understand how rent can be better than own it?

2003-05-24 1:16 am

lets see….pay each month to download music that I do not own and if I don’t pay one month I cannot listen to the music……OR own the music and never have to make another purchace again while still enjoying the product I payed for.

MS just does not get it….I think they are doing this more to showcase their paladium than to actualy provide the consumer with anything of substance.

2003-05-24 1:19 am

It will be possibly cheaper. That’s better enough for most people after hearing the same song over and over again for a week.

I have already rented music, it was a Toni Braxton wma song a few months ago. After listening to it for 15 days, it was enough and I didn’t mind stop having access to it.

Also, I hear that WMA is much better than mp3 in most cases, and certainly better than Apple’s format. Not sure about ogg though.

2003-05-24 1:32 am

It’s the same as owning a house. Which is more preferable to most consumers? Owning a house. What most urban consumers do in the end? Rent a place to stay. Why? Because it is cheaper.

Personally, I prefer the idea of owning. (I do own my own house, BTW, in sub-urban Kuala Lumpur).

2003-05-24 1:41 am

Before you know it, MS would be the one that invented iTunes!!!

Seriously, though, you gotta give MS credit for working hard to match or beat the competition. The world would be a better place if companies like Sun and Oracle, not to mention SCO, would learn to do the same.

Rent or own? I’ll rather own. When I get sick of the song, I’ll do what I always do, which is put it away for a couple of months.

2003-05-24 1:41 am

Would you be able to burn it to listen to it away from your computer, or even listen to it on your OTHER computer?

What it include a reach around cause it sounds like the user gets ****ed.

2003-05-24 1:47 am

Why haven’t they cornered this obvious market also? Their name fits right in with the marketing….

But seriously, we don’t really want MicroSoft*** stuff. When will they learn that too much MS is a bad thing. I think most MS-bashers here are really just tired of the constant attempts by MS to enter every conceivable market and tie it to windows. Realize that Coca-cola, Phillip-Moriss, GM, pepsi, Disney and others have fingers in all sorts of stuff, but keep their name off it because people burn out. [imagine every Disney product with big ears, or every phillip-morris product with a little ciggarette sticker] Even IBM has had to back off the branding, because people preceive them as too strung-out.

MS does quite well as a silent partner in several fields, and they need to learn to do it more–that’s where the real money is! I’ll bet you could find ten things from GE, Allen-Bradley, or Dow chemical [OK they might not be labeled] in the next 5 minutes, but you don’t see them raming marketing down our throats do you!

2003-05-24 1:50 am

iTunes doesn’t allow you to listen to it on your other computer… unless it is networked to the one having the song and the song is played directly from there. Same goes for Microsoft.

2003-05-24 1:51 am

>> MS does quite well as a silent

>> partner in several fields

Well, does it matter if they are quiet or silent about their involvement? Either way, they are involved. What’s scary is not that they have been loquacious about it. The concern is that the IT industry will end up pretty much like the American media -in a few powerful hands – making it a lot more easier to brainwash people and engage in all forms of sociological mind control. Of all reasons, that’s why I would be happy to see alternatives in everything.

But hey, what to do? Stop ms for going out for business? That, too, is intolerable, os its up to the competition to step up.

2003-05-24 1:57 am

Also, I hear that WMA is much better than mp3 in most cases, and certainly better than Apple’s format. Not sure about ogg though.

What’s your basis for this? I mean I know wma’s better than mp3, but I haven’t seen any real comparisons of the formats aside from “I think this sounds better.” It’d be nice to see someone make three seperate encodings and then compare how much is preserved at the same bitrate.

2003-05-24 2:04 am

How much cheaper can you get than paying $.99 for a song and owning it forever?

Anybody want to bet this music will only be playable on Windows and certain portable devices loaded to the gills with DRM ?

If I can’t play my music how I want, where I want, and when I want, I’m just not interested.

2003-05-24 2:06 am

Microsoft has nothing at this time that really works so they announce Vaporware, why would anyone be against open standards MP4 (not owned or controlled by a single company) or Microsofts crap format WMA, which if you are dumb enough to use in a commercial situation leaves you at Microsofts mercy in the long run. Again where’s the Beef?” ahh! Vaporware?

2003-05-24 2:15 am

I think most Apple user have bought their OS (and then hardware of course). I wonder on Microsoft side: how about all those illegal version of Window$ ? Would it not prevent many people from buying music from MS ?

Funny, is it ? MS has 95 % of home market in theory. But if 95 % of this home market is illegal version of Window$ then MS will barely have more customers than Apple

Just a thought … I am pretty sure that MS will never check the license validity for this service.

2003-05-24 2:27 am

“iTunes doesn’t allow you to listen to it on your other computer… unless it is networked to the one having the song and the song is played directly from there. Same goes for Microsoft.”

That is not true. Apple allows you the song you downloaded be played on up to three concurrent computers, yes, an actual copy of the song sitting on the hd of the computer. But saying it has to be directly played, or streamed, from the other computer is a lie.

2003-05-24 2:28 am

He added that he’s confident consumers eventually will warm up to subscription services once they support wider copying rights and their value is better understood.

Just like customers warmed up to renting software. Sure….

2003-05-24 2:39 am

iTunes doesn’t allow you to listen to it on your other computer

Yes it does. You can activate up to 3 computers on a single account.

2003-05-24 2:40 am

Music is rarely a rentable thing. People form attachments to music, and never know when they want to listen to a certain song.

If there can be choice, great. Usually you’ll want to rent samples for pennies, then buy a song for a buck.

2003-05-24 3:04 am

Why the “f” can’t microsoft let Apple (or anybody else) have one sucessful thing all to themselves. As massive as they are, you’d think they would let something like this go.

What a bunch of sorry ass copycats. And a monopoly. Too bad it looks like they bought off the government…

– Mark

2003-05-24 3:18 am

This is just as stupid as the self-destructing dvd’s, i can see it now: people rent a song for a cheap price, people install a drm crack, people rip their song to mp3, people share it in kazaa or gnutella. It’s just like thinking that people can’t rip a dvd to divx before the dvd self-destructs.

A funny thing about demo pages; about a year ago when Microsoft put up a demo page trumpeting how the newly released WMA 8 beat Real 8 in 64kbps quality, they included a number of samples purportedly demonstrating that WMA was now clearly superior. I read the page at that time, shook my head and thought to myself, “Poor Real. Microsoft finally caught them.” I didn’t even listen to the samples, but I left the page with a clear idea in my head that WMA 8 really was better than Real.

Odd thing, though; a few months later I finally listened to those demo samples side by side… and was actually surprised to find that Real was clearly superior in every featured demo comparison. It wasn’t even really close, and these were samples hand picked by Microsoft to show off WMA.

I haven’t done enough low bitrate listening to really compare (except AAC vs MP3. MP3 is completely unlistenable before I can tell the difference between AAC and CDDA), but I have heard one thing about WMA: it raises the volume a few decibles which creates the impression of better quality to the untrained ear (like mine).

2003-05-24 4:36 am

I remember the discussion on the iTunes Music Store how people thought it was ridiculous and insane. The price of $1 per tune was too much for their cable connected 3GHZ HT P4s with 1GB of RDRAM.

Now MS wants people to rent their music collection and if they don’t pay the monthly fee when the clock runs out they have no music. Already people are saying, “Its about damn time MS rented my music to me and cut me off when I didn’t pay!”

Its really strange how people interpret innovation. I understand that Apple’s concept may not be new but I think the other music services were taken aback by how many downloads Apple was able to rack up from so few Mac users. The other music services have access to 98% of the computer market yet they can’t generate the sales Apple has even with as much as a year’s head start.

None of the services on the PC side are that good or worth paying for. I’ve looked at most of them and they suck. Their is no app on the PC side as well integrated as iTunes at this time.

The fact is that people are not buying music on the PC side. How will MS get people to rent their music when they are not even buying it to begin with?

2003-05-24 5:00 am

“iTunes doesn’t allow you to listen to it on your other computer… unless it is networked to the one having the song and the song is played directly from there. Same goes for Microsoft.”

That is not true. Apple allows you the song you downloaded be played on up to three concurrent computers, yes, an actual copy of the song sitting on the hd of the computer. But saying it has to be directly played, or streamed, from the other computer is a lie.

Don’t forget, you can also burn unlimited copies to CD.

2003-05-24 5:35 am

Apple better get out their windows version F A S T ! December may not be soon enough! A linux version would not hurt

2003-05-24 6:08 am

At last, a subject I can rant about, being a former recording engineer.

All these formats have one thing in common. In order to compact the file to approximately 1/10 the size of the raw data file, the file must lose 90 percent of the data that the human ear hears. Now, due to some interesting evolutionary quirks in our brains, we don’t really notice the loss that much, even though the loss is there.

The only real difference between these compression formats is what frequencies have been left out. mp3 compresses most bands pretty equally across the spectrum. WMA leaves intact most of the upper midrange, resulting in a perceived increase in volume and clarity-these frequencies are also the ones the human ear is programmed to respond to most, as they lie in the range of human speech. AAC emphasizes many of the same frequencies and also enhances the high (8khz to 16khz)range, resulting in an increased perception of clarity, but to my ear AAC really pulls a lot of the bass information out, resulting in a “boxy”, somewhat lifeless sound to the bottom end. Real encoding pulls a fair amount of information out of the midrange and some from the bass.

What it boils down to is that 128 kbps of data is just that, irregardless of the algorithm being used to encode it. It is only 1/10 of the original information that was present in the first place. To my ear, every one of these formats sound horrible in comparison to the source.

What gets under my skin a bit is that all the expense and effort that has been put into recording music to the highest quality possible is now being thrown right back out the window on the distribution end.

Sad to see the world being robbed of quality in the name of convenience, but that seems to be the name of the game these days.

My 2 cents. Thanks for listening.

2003-05-24 6:46 am

Owning vs renting is more of a issue of society. For example, in New Zealand and Australia, one wants to own a house as a nest egg for later on. Most people were bought up with the notion of a 1/4 acher section and a 3 bedroom house.

Renting, depending on where you are living, is basically dead money. After 20years, what do you have? nothing. You can keep paying for another 20years, and what do you still have? nothing. Renting in a nutshell is dead money.

2003-05-24 6:51 am

Well, unfortunately, I don’t have a CC to use for purchasing music off the net. Yes, I know I can have a CC, however, if I had a 1000 limit, I would find some way of spening $1200.

What Apple need to do in Australia is team up with Paymate, Paymate links to your bank account and then you the consumer use paymate to pay for things. If Apple allowed that, I would be more than happy to pay for music via the net.

If they decide to go subscription, I’ll leave and go back to paying for CD’s that I atleast know will be available for me to play back in 2-3years time.

2003-05-24 7:00 am

/me loads up Qtella

Hmm, free music here…

Why would anyone pay, or rent music when you can get it for free?

The .OGG format is freely distributable, so if you don’t want to break the law for some ethical reason, use that. If a CD sucks, don’t pay for the odd song or two, if you deem a CD worth the price at the store, get it from there. I was against Apple selling songs, and I am definatly against Microsoft doing it.

Noone has probably looked into how an artest profits from this. It seems that Microsoft and Apple are simply going to be licensing the songs from the record labels only. Sure its not illegal, by its still not supporting the artist. How is downloading for free any worse then buying from someone who won’t show a penny of the purchase price to the actual artists?

I would rather take a trip down to the local record store and purchase a CD, at least that way I know where (at least a small percentage) is going…

2003-05-24 7:09 am

That is why I am very picky about the CD’s I buy. For most people, an $8.99 el chepo, best of music CD may be a great deal, however, if you compared it with a 96-khz, 24bit remastered version, you can hear the difference.

Sure, there is a difference in price. For a decent re-mastered Dave Brubeck CD set, it is going to set you back atleast AUS$60 for a 3cd set, and that is on special.

I also agree with you on the compressed music vs. original, there is a difference. I say it would have less to do with “evolution” and more to do with whether the person has a musical background. Having played the piano for for many years, it is like comparing Live vs. Source vs. compressed music.

I may sound like a purist, IMHO music always sounds best with live band vs. the pre-recorded techniques used these days. Nothing sounds better than a talented singer with a live band and vocals as back up.

2003-05-24 8:41 am

Couldn’t agree more with you.

I probably shouldn’t say this, but will…I support piracy. Really. Anyone who wants to download can go right ahead as far as I’m concerned. Take it all.

A recording contract is the closest thing to slavery in these times. The musicians get virtually nothing. Record companies take it all, and if that isn’t bad enough, they then force the artists to eat all the expenses. The argument that they lay out a bunch of money to produce ten artists for every one that makes money is, well, a lie. Flat out, Enron-style accounting lie.

A artist who sells a million albums, well, that artist is fortunate to make $30K off the deal, unless they own the distribution rights, which costs millions of dollars to buy back from the record companies. Apple’s iTunes and similar plans, frankly, do not help the situation any, but merely recast the distribution channels for their own benefit.

I’d like nothing better than to see the record companies broken and bankrupt. Artists would then have to play live for their money, a situation which everyone except the prefab crap bands would benefit from immensely.

Recordings used to be an agent to promote the artist’s live shows…and frankly, this needs to be the way things are done again.

2003-05-24 8:43 am

Apple better get out their windows version F A S T ! December may not be soon enough! A linux version would not hurt

It doesn’t matter if Apple makes a Windows version or not. Microsoft will kill it. All the technology for the music “renting” will be bundled with the OS as well as links shown prominently in IE or on the IE homepage (whatever that defaults to).

People wont even know about the Apple version, even if it’s way superior. People wont even bother looking for an alternative, they live in a world of Microsoft (similar to the Matrix so it seems).

If you think otherwise, then you need to look at history. Microsoft needs to be gotten rid of. Now.

2003-05-24 8:58 am

Which am I more worried? Microsoft controlling one format, and MPAA and well as some IT companies controlling the other. Hmmm, I can’t decided.

But open standards means anyone can add on to it… right? In this case, nope. MPEG is pretty much like an exclusive club. Even if you can get in, you probably can’t influence much. And open standards naturally means free of royalties? MP4 requires more loose change than WMA.

As for the vaporware theory, so? So what if Microsoft never releases it? After promising various RIAA member that they would, I mean how much money loosing file suits can they recieve and how bad is it being seen as “bad guy” by the RIAA? Yeap, I’m sure it isn’t vaporware. Stuff like Great Plains is vaporware, they don’t loose anything hyping it and releasing nothing, and they sure get a lot in return.

2003-05-24 9:08 am

I personally don’t dissagree with you. But how many people can afford buying a whole house? Barely anyone. Sure, in the long run, you save more money by owning your own house, but to most people it isn’t what they save in the long run rather what they can afford now.

2003-05-24 9:25 am

music piracy is here to stay. only way to make money from it soon will be to licence it for stuff that contain it, like movies and videogames (2 other thing that get pirated ).

Now music is no more a product, it’s a bait to sell bandwith. Just like the playground at mc donald to attract kid.

2003-05-24 9:30 am

Also, I hear that WMA is much better than mp3 in most cases, and certainly better than Apple’s format. Not sure about ogg though.

Well, let me first start with my background on this… I was very interested in perceptual media for quite some time, got in on the Ogg Vorbis project quite early (I wrote the first Ogg Vorbis module for a media player, for XMMS, and was the first person to ever listen to Ogg Vorbis in a car

MPEG-2 AAC is an incredible technology. Unfortunately it’s encumbered with patents from such names as Sony and Dolby, unlike MP3 which is largely a creation of Fraunhoffer, or WMA which is a creation of Microsoft.

Microsoft has been quite insistent upon CBR, and has somehow managed to do an excellent job with a CBR codec. However AAC uses something called a Polyphase Quadrature Filter to quantitize the data, much in the way a cable modem converts amplitude modulation (or rather, Quadrature Amplitude Modulation) into a discrete signal. The transform is discrete, but works on multiple phases of data and thus isn’t hindered by a predetermined signaling rate.

MP3 and Ogg utilize a FFT derivative known as the MDCT (Modified Discrete Cosine Transform) to produce Fourier coefficients which can be selectively compressed and recombinated into a waveform resembling the original.

I don’t know what algorithm WMA uses offhand, but my guess would also be the MDCT.

At any rate, AAC is quite an advanced technology utilizing algorithms from some of the top names in audio engineering. Certainly it shouldn’t be discounted, even if it hasn’t seen the amount of tuning work that has gone into the codebooks for MP3 and OGG.

2003-05-24 9:36 am

Why the “f” can’t microsoft let Apple (or anybody else) have one sucessful thing all to themselves. As massive as they are, you’d think they would let something like this go.

Stopping and being content with what you have without moving forward is like hanging yourself to death. Always moving is the way to go. How would they know? Suddently something, a killer app, comes out to the market like Internet came, and Microsoft looses its monopoly. File for bankruptcy?

And why should they allow a competitor who, BTW, doesn’t provide for Windows users for now, get the whole market? Why can’t they try? It doesn’t mean they automatically win – they have lost many times.

And best of all, Apple would be forced to improve their services even more.

That’s bad? If so, it is also hypocritical.

What a bunch of sorry ass copycats.

Yeah, like Apple’s idea is a genuinely briliantly original idea whom no one thought prior to it…. NOT. Welcome to the real world, where every successful company copies.

Besides, it isn’t like there was much of a subscription market prior to Microsoft entering the market with PressPlay.

And a monopoly.

Yeap, and being one is so bad. Funny thing is that everytime when CAD gets mention, no one complain about AutoCAD’s monopoly (especially when they are very well eligible for antitrust smacking). I can go on, but you get my point. Being a monopoly doesn’t mean bad. Stop trying to make it sound like a bad word it isn’t.

Too bad it looks like they bought off the government…

Oh well, even if it is true they bought off the government (highly unlikely), they aren’t the first one. Oil companies, Arab nations (especially Saudi Arabia), the evangelicals.

2003-05-24 9:37 am

Got the wrong title for the previious post. Should be Re: Microsoft.

2003-05-24 9:53 am

I’m suprised no large company (AFAIK) has attempted to make a serious compressed lossless format, so far the best I’ve found are .ape which is a compression of 4:1 so far larger than .mp3 .ogg .wma, and FLAC which is again 4:1 at best.

BTW, does anybody know how good mp3PRO or mp3+ are compared to the normal .mp3?

2003-05-24 10:42 am

If I rent a song from Microsoft what is to stop me using an Audio Ripper to grab the audio as MP3, or writing it to an audio CD? Renting is a silly proposition in the real world, it is likely to end up more expensive in the long run if you need to re-rent it again in 3 months time.

2003-05-24 10:55 am

There are arguments for and against subscription music.

The mature response is to have both subscription and pay-per-download services available and competing on a relatively level playing field. Then you can watch where your customers go. Market forces at work.

Whether this is what happens is another story. To some degree, everyone wants to exert their will over others, and the board members of the “big 5” labels are no exception. Market forces mean they can’t have all things their preferred way, and that irritates them.

As a customer, however, that’s not my problem. I have my own wishes as well, one of them being that I want to not be forced to continue to do business with organisations where it isn’t mandated by law. A number of the current subscription models would require me to do this; the iTunes Music Store does not.

Let the best model win. The labels make money, the artists hopefully see their fair share of it, and as a customer I get the music I want to listen to in the places and ways I want to listen to it, to reflect my mood, to change my mood, to get me thinking and to inspire me.

Shame on those that are against an “everyone wins” situation because it doesn’t reflect their view of how the world should work. This applies to artists, staff at the labels, and members of the community alike.

2003-05-24 10:55 am

“What’s your basis for this? I mean I know wma’s better than mp3, but I haven’t seen any real comparisons of the formats aside from “I think this sounds better.” It’d be nice to see someone make three seperate encodings and then compare how much is preserved at the same bitrate.”

None of them will be accurate, so you have to make a value judgement as to which faults matter most. It might depend on the genre.

Lossy compression is a bad thing, a major step backward in audio technology. I hope its use is only temporary, until drives and bandwidths increase.

2003-05-24 11:04 am

Since when is a measly dollar for a song comparable to buying a house? I agree that renting is a necessity for many people, simply because getting the cash together to buy a house is a considerable investment. BUT, a dollar for a song you want is by no means a considerable investment. It’s an impulse buy pure and simple.

Whatever online music distribution model is the easiest to use and least intrusive will win out. I just don’t see the whole subscription idea as being unintrusive. An annoying hassle is more like it.

2003-05-24 11:17 am

Yeap, and being one is so bad. Funny thing is that everytime when CAD gets mention, no one complain about AutoCAD’s monopoly (especially when they are very well eligible for antitrust smacking). I can go on, but you get my point. Being a monopoly doesn’t mean bad. Stop trying to make it sound like a bad word it isn’t.

Actually, a monopoly is bad, except in very few cases. Software is *not* one of those cases. So yes, the monopoly of AutoCAD is bad. If there was competition prices would go down, and there would be more innovation. The only reason why no one complains about AutoCAD is simply because almost nobody uses it.

2003-05-24 11:27 am

Actually, a monopoly is bad, except in very few cases. Software is *not* one of those cases. So yes, the monopoly of AutoCAD is bad. If there was competition prices would go down, and there would be more innovation. The only reason why no one complains about AutoCAD is simply because almost nobody uses it.

Also, I don’t know of any instances where the company has abused it monopoly to block vendors from entering the marketplace. Infact, I have seen more willingness by AutoCAD to create industry standard file formats for easier interoperability vs’s the dogmatic change-a-roo Microsoft does every release.

2003-05-24 11:29 am

is like paying for listenning to the radio station you like. I am sure this gets the music execs very excited, but it will never catch. You can find great music on public airwave or net radio stations, including cryptic indy bands.

2003-05-24 2:42 pm

Apple better get out their windows version F A S T ! December may not be soon enough! A linux version would not hurt

It’s not entirely in Apple’s hands. The record companies want to limit the program to see what the on-line revenues are and what happens to their CD sales. I’m sure they’re encouraged about the response so far.

Jobs and Apple have the credibility with creatives, consumers, and college kids that others in the tech industry (esp. Microsoft) lack. That’s the real reason they were able to pull it off, and that advantage won’t go away anytime soon.

2003-05-24 2:50 pm

it all depends on the country you live in. Here in the US most people buy a home at some point in their life. in India, I can under stand that owning is more difficult because of population desity…..but NZ and AU have low density rates so owning would be easy there.

2003-05-24 2:56 pm

It will be cheaper than Apple’s service. It will also be less elegant, more difficult to use, carry more restrictions, and will certainly invade the users privacy through spyware or other such mechanisms, which Microsquish will keep secret. Unfortunately, they have proven over and over again that they can sell shit, but as long as its cheap, it will succeed.

I do not pay for MS software, and try and avoid their free software like the plague.

2003-05-24 3:58 pm

I will never buy music online. I prefer to search for new bands, download their albums in mp3/ogg, and then either buy their CD or delete their album. Maybe I’ll consider those services when they’ll offer DRM-less & lossless music with the cover/booklet/tray card in at high quality format for 75% the price of a CD. So I guess I’ll never buy music online…

I just hope that music won’t become exclusively online in 10~20 years, especially if they’re still using shitty lossy codecs.

2003-05-24 4:02 pm

And what, you have IBM’s “business time machine”?

In reality you know NOTHING about the service, you don’t even know that it will be provided by Microsoft (Microsoft is very rarely the provider of services, they generaly write the software and allow other companies to take advantage of it).

What is the basis for your ‘spyware’ FUD? Oh, you have none?

Oh, ok…..

2003-05-24 4:14 pm

MS is renowed for putting spyware in their products that will phone home. However, I must admit that it doesn’t mean that their iTunes clone will have some. I guess some people are paranoiac.

2003-05-24 4:41 pm

I’m guessing Eugenia has done some listening tests to back up what she said. When iTMS came out I listened to a few tracks and found them to sound much “smoother” than I would expect, although I had trouble finding any music I had a strong familiarity with. Initially I blamed this on AAC, so I set out to do comparisons of AAC to MP3.

I soon realized I had to go down to insanely low bitrates with AAC to hear any difference between that and the original. MP3 was sounding severely “frequency shifted” (to my perception), or should I just say “shitty ass hell” before I heard any difference in ACC.

I blame the differences I heard in the original Apple samples on the direct record from masters. Apple’s version didn’t sound like CD quality, it sounded better than digital. Course that is my inexpert oppinion and I might be really wrong, whereas I’m quite sure about the side by side encoding vs MP3.

2003-05-24 5:12 pm

Wrawrat:

Renowned eh? Do you have ANY proof… I asked for PROOF, not for your FUD.

2003-05-24 5:29 pm

iTunes.NET!

2003-05-24 5:53 pm

Yeah I’ve run illegal copies of XP.. I admit it

I also have a dedicated cable connection, no firewall either. If there’s spyware all over OfficeXP and WinXP why is it so easy to pirate these? The only profitable products MS produces?

Give the Spyware BS a rest.

2003-05-24 6:27 pm

Subscription is a failure. It’s been tested and failed. Why does anyone think this is going to change? Why should people pay to “sample” music. They want to hear it free (i.e, like internet radio) or buy it. MS is just out of touch.

Eveyone assumes history is going to repeat itself. Apple comes out with the great idea, and then others make the money. However, I think this time it is going to be different. Why? It used to be that the superior Apple solution was more money (and it used to be a LOT more). Even once apple got closer in price, it was too late and most people had windows already. Sure, lots of people realized still were unhappy with windows, but switching to the mac required buying a new computer, new software, investing time learning the new system, etc. In other words, lots of money. The mac was better, but not worth the cost.

But now – provided the record companies play ball on licensing for the windows version – iTunes for Windows is going to be a FREE download. It’s going to be the best, easiest to use music software with an integrated download service out there. And even if there are others – they won’t match apple. Sure, that’s a prediction and I could be wrong, but I feel it’s safe prediction because Apple is brilliant in ease of use and the others are not. So even if there is competition when iTunes for Windows is released – and right now it does not look like there will be – or competition later exists, people will be able to choose the superior Apple ease of use FOR FREE. That is the critical difference. BETTER WILL BE THE SAME PRICE.

Now let’s see what happens, OK?

2003-05-25 12:08 am

WMA 9 has lossless compression.

2003-05-25 1:20 am

From: appleforever

Subscription is a failure. It’s been tested and failed. Why does anyone think this is going to change?

I don’t personally think it will.

But remember, these exact same things were said about the original iMac, for example. “It’ll float like a lead balloon” “Apple is out of touch” “More Jobs rubbish” et al. And the iMac was successful, much to the chagrain* of at least some of those naysayers people.

Most of the posters here believe subscription music isn’t going anywhere soon. “It’ll float like a lead balloon” “Microsoft is out of touch” “More Gates/Ballmer rubbish” et al. But whether it actually does sink is going to depend on how well it is integrated, how well it is marketed, and how much of a burden the ongoing payments are perceived to be.

In short, lets’ wait until it actually does sink before we point and laugh. Doing so beforehand is what allows MacObserver to keep adding stuff to their Apple Death Knell Counter page.

* OT: I actually read a posting on a site *somewhere* after the very successful launch of the iMac saying that, as Windows was the standard, if the iMac continued to be successful “that the future would be an endless stream of incompatibilities and confusion” and that was why “the iMac needs to be stopped, and stopped now”. Unbelieveable gall!

2003-05-25 2:32 am

All the article talked about was how Microsoft is going to add more and more security and control systems to Windows and to portable devices so Microsoft can control how the customer listens to music.

As for Microsoft spyware, Microsoft already treats “out of system” music files as pirated files and their new software will report these files to the authorities.

So if you have any MP3’s that you’ve made in the past that don’t have all the DRM voodoo, you’re assumed to be a music pirate and Microsoft will do all they can to put you in jail.

What do you expect from the world’s #1 fascist computing company? If you care about your life, learn Linux or save your pennies to get a Mac.

2003-05-25 4:28 am

Quit spreading FUD. Not one word of that is true. MP3s and other unprotected formats are freely usable. If they weren’t, you couldn’t even use unprotected WMAs.

Linux has no music services, and it’ll take more than pennies to get a Mac.

2003-05-25 5:35 am

Could not agree more. Comparing renting a house to buying a CD is well you know.

The only thing good about the digital music is that it allows the person to buy the song I want. What would be even better would be to eb able to pick any ten songs I want and pay for a custom CD to be shipped to me at the same price I can get one from Amazon. Maybe even 2 bucks more.

2003-05-25 6:01 am

Obviously you are not running the latest version of Windows Media Player and associated DRM. It treats out-of-system MP3 files as unauthorized (i.e. pirated) media files.

One of the beta releases even asked you to insert the original CD so it could check to see if the files were legal.

Microsoft views their OS as a control system over people. The USDOJ let Microsoft off without any penalty in their antitrust case so that the government gets access to this control system.

Microsoft and the USGOVT have mutually compatible goals. Microsoft wants as much of your money in the form of license and access fees, and the USGOVT wants to keep track of people and make sure they get their tax money.

The people who continue to use Windows are going to be in for a rude awakening as every detail of their lives is sent to Microsoft and then shared with the government.

Once there is a digital record, you can be found guilty of anything provided anyone with access to your records makes a few mouse clicks. You can go from good citizen to child pornographer in 5 clicks. Once Microsoft has implemented full system monitoring in Windows, near total control over the populace will have been achieved.

If you don’t want your life to be part of the government’s digital record, you have to use a Mac (rich people have better rights than poor people) or a Linux box (techno rebels will be tolerated for a while and then put in prison later).

2003-05-25 6:58 am

Please, this is an obvious troll.

I am using the latest Windows Media Player. All my media files play fine, including MP3s. I’m never asked to insert the original CD. This, like the content of your other post is FUD.

Microsoft’s DRM technologies provide an alternative to the RI/MPAA pushing the government to implement mandatory protection hardware that probably would monitor your files.

MS has pushed against mandatory controls and has never used spyware. They are extending their tech to allow more flexibility with portable devices when used with subscription services. That is it. It is up to providers like pressplay or MusicNow to figure out the best business model to use, whether that is supscription, sale-through, or both. MS doesn’t sale music, and doesn’t care what music is on your computer beyond offering creation, playback and organization.

FYI, Macs use DRM too, and Linux isn’t far away. Blame people who steal content for evoking a response from the providers.

2003-05-25 7:40 am

Everything that may be considered negative about Microsoft is not FUD. You will remember, Microsoft Media Player DID INDEED send information on what music the user played back to Microsoft. That is the genesis of the advanced privacy settings. For someone to defend Microsoft vis-a-vis privacy or spyware is just ridiculous. Microsoft has the worst record of any OS vendor when it comes to spying on their customers.

I’m not saying MP3 files don’t PLAY. I said that internally the DRM does not consider these files to be legitimately owned by the user. In the shipping version of WMP, Microsoft turned off all the warnings otherwise they would have been swamped with phone calls and negative PR.

Microsoft’s goal is to destroy MP3 as a file format and force everyone to use WMA. I know you know this, so don’t come back with some litany of denial.

For music, beyond creation, playback, and organization, what is there? In order to playback music, Microsoft has folded in DRM. The creation side of music is poorly supported as Microsoft doesn’t make money here. And when it comes to organization, WMP is one giant DRM monitoring device, keeping track of the DRM on every single music file it can find on your system.

Microsoft has an agreement to share user data with the USGOVT. Microsoft ships with Magic Lantern as part of Windows XP so when the GOVT wants to spy on someone, they can just flip a switch. Microsoft has a long history of supporting all DRM legislation that will help Microsoft profits, no matter how inhumane or anti-customer it is.

Sure Mac uses DRM for music. But they at least give you ownership rights for the music you purchase. Microsoft is implementing systems that give the user no ownership rights. That is why the article talks about ‘clocks’ even for mobile music devices that can kill your music if you don’t pay your upkeep fees. Linux may end up using DRM, but since the source is available, it will always be an option. And you will know what the DRM does and doesn’t do because the source is available. Microsoft DRM is secret and unpublished, even to the 50 governments that can see the Windows source code.

All in all, until Microsoft publishes their source code and enables their products to be built from the published code, no one can trust their Microsoft OS computer. Not for music, not for data, not for browsing, not for anything.

2003-05-25 2:36 pm

Most of the posters here believe subscription music isn’t going anywhere soon. “It’ll float like a lead balloon” “Microsoft is out of touch” “More Gates/Ballmer rubbish” et al. But whether it actually does sink is going to depend on how well it is integrated, how well it is marketed, and how much of a burden the ongoing payments are perceived to be.

The Microsoft guys aren’t fools, they can see that Apple is scoring big here. Evidently, they haven’t been able to reach agreement with the record companies allowing them to provide a similar service (non-subscription based). Until they do, they’ll do their best to muffle Apple’s marketing with their own service, so Consumer Reports type reviews will be sure to mention them both and waffle their conclusions with “if you want this, choose Apple.. but if you prefer that, choose Microsoft”.

I expect Microsoft will switch to the iTunes model the first chance they get.

2003-05-25 3:28 pm

Funny how this always boils down to the zealots spouting their half truths. Sure, MS isn’t the most trustworthy, but Apple isn’t either. Can anybody confirm that Apple isn’t sharing everybody’s personal info with the RIAA/Gov’t? Apple already has a lock into the hardware of their customer’s pcs. There’s probably back doors hard-wired into the circuitry. Good luck trying to circumvent that…

Now, on to the math lesson. Apple sells individual songs (with some restrictions attached), for 99 cents a piece. Okay, a typical cd nowadays has an average of 13 songs. If you pieced the cd together from Apple, it would cost $12.87

Shopping around at retail stores (not online), the average price (in my area anyway) is $13.95.

You save a whopping $1.08 .

But, it’s only AAC, not the best format, and only plays in a iPod. The cd (with some exceptions), can be ripped perefectly into a plethora of codecs and used anywhere, at anytime, with no restrictions whatsoever.

For the record, 99% of my cds come from the used cd store and generally cost $6 to $9. Do I need to do the math here?

2003-05-25 7:19 pm

“WMA 9 has lossless compression.”

I gather the files are around 2-3 times the size of MP3s, which is pretty good for lossless compression of audio. In contrast to text, audio is very hard to compress.

2003-05-25 7:40 pm

Michael, check the EULA. Windows Media Player gets metadata for music/DVDs that you play from a database just like other players grab info from CDDB. It is not spyware.

The only data the player sends to Microsoft is annonymous crash data and possibly product version info for it’s auto-update functionality if you choose to enable those options. This is also true of Windows with the exception of Product Activation data which is sent and stored as a hash.

Everything that may be considered negative about Microsoft is not FUD, however the contents of your posts are. This is my last post on this thread because it wastes my time to feed trolls like you (or maybe you’re just a highly paranoid/delusional content thief), and it wastes the time of anyone that reads your FUD.

2003-05-25 8:04 pm

Anonymous Do you work for Microsoft? WMA format isn’t good for the average user in any way shape or form. Microsoft has been unable to get an agreement with any of the record companies because even they aren’t that dumb.

2003-05-25 8:32 pm

Windows Media Player 9:

1. Retrieves media information from the Internet, logging to the server what is retrieved and who retrieved it.

2. Retrieves music file data from the Internet, logging what songs it is retrieved for and who retrieved it.

3. Acquires licenses automatically for protected content. Note that these ‘licenses’ may indeed cause files to be deleted on your system if terms of said ‘license’ do not agree with what Microsoft DRM thinks is legal/legitimate.

4. Sends unique ID to content providers.

5. Sends unique cookies to content providers.

6. Sends undocumented player usage data to Microsoft.

7. Checks for updates in an undocumented fashion and then installs updates without telling the user what the updates are.

8. Downloads codecs not on the local machine keeping a remote usage log of what codecs you use and what files they are being used for.

10. Installs undocumented DRM components on your computer for even non-Microsoft apps such as Mozilla. Does not support uninstalling DRM.

11. Illegally copy-protects music that you own. If you copy music from a CD, the default operation is to copy protect those files thus making them unusable on another computer.

12. Individualizes all key components of the run-time client, making everything you do via WMP traceable to you.

13. Can change at any time. Given the legal disclaimers that are part of the licensing for WMP, essentially Microsoft can do whatever they want whenever they want. There is no telling what is actually going on because there is no binding contract with remedies that prevents Microsoft from dynamically changing the license terms.

2003-05-26 3:31 am

Michael: As for Microsoft spyware, Microsoft already treats “out of system” music files as pirated files and their new software will report these files to the authorities.

Completely identical to the FUD that was spread before Windows XP reach beta. And even during beta. And some really stupid ABMers still claim such after beta.

Guess what? I have at least 3 gb of oggs, MP3s, and the likes. Nothing got deleted. Bummer.

So I am expected to believe this drivel that in the future, all that files would be deleted or cease to work?

Michael: So if you have any MP3’s that you’ve made in the past that don’t have all the DRM voodoo, you’re assumed to be a music pirate and Microsoft will do all they can to put you in jail.

Only the copyright owner can put you in jail. And so far, RIAA doesn’t seem all that keen in using the court against casual piraters. They may if you are sharing 30GBs of files you never owned on Kazaa while being a Supernode, but that’s casual piracy? Heh.

Microsoft on the other hand can’t.

Michael: What do you expect from the world’s #1 fascist computing company?

Don’t ever use the word fascist to describe something if you never lived through a fascist government. Malaysia is a fascist country. The government exalts the nation and the Malay race above individual rights. Microsoft on the other hand is totally not fascist. I can open my own software company and compete directly with Microsoft? Would it fail? Obviously, if I don’t know how to run a company and I threw out that “Marketing for Dummies” book…

Michael: If you care about your life, learn Linux or save your pennies to get a Mac.

Ohhhhhhhhhhh, yeeeesssssssssss, I’m so scared. I’m going to limit my productivity on Linux for no apparent reason but just plain unsanctioned stupid paranoia….. or better still, waste my money on a computer whom which at the same price I could get something really better…. ohhhhhhhhh….

2003-05-26 3:43 am

Obviously you are not running the latest version of Windows Media Player and associated DRM. It treats out-of-system MP3 files as unauthorized (i.e. pirated) media files.

Funny. I just opened Windows Media Player, open some oggs and MP3s into a playlist, didn’t see a flashing “UNAUTHORIZED!!!” in red or anything to say that it is unauthorized.

One of the beta releases even asked you to insert the original CD so it could check to see if the files were legal.

Apparently such big news that ever news sources, including those anti-MS (The Register, etc.) neglected to mention it?

Microsoft views their OS as a control system over people. The USDOJ let Microsoft off without any penalty in their antitrust case so that the government gets access to this control system./i]

Yes, I’m sure the USDOJ would love to see you music listening habits…

[i]Microsoft wants as much of your money in the form of license and access fees, and the USGOVT wants to keep track of people and make sure they get their tax money.

Hehe, if they ban unprotected music on your computer, what money can Microsoft make? RIAA would be racking it in. And the IRS is already doing a mighty fine job of tracking people down, thank you very much (which comes as a irony when the Congress voted to reduce taxes..)

The people who continue to use Windows are going to be in for a rude awakening as every detail of their lives is sent to Microsoft and then shared with the government.

Oh yes… hahaha :-). If that’s the case, governments overseas would be dumping it by the thousands, right? I mean, why would governments like China and Russia want to let Microsoft know all of their citizen’s life?

You can go from good citizen to child pornographer in 5 clicks.

They already can do that pretty much well nowadays, without spying on your comp. ISP records, for example.

Linux box (techno rebels will be tolerated for a while and then put in prison later).

I envision many “technorebels” at the NSA would be arrested and put in prison later.

2003-05-26 4:17 am

Microsoft is not working to get a contract with record companies. All it wants is that its product is used. That means, they want stuff like PressPlay and the likes. That means many different companies and services can use WMP, which is far more profitable than providing the service for themselves and having to compete directly with all these already existing market players.

Re:

1. Retrieves media information from the Internet, logging to the server what is retrieved and who retrieved it.

They do that for precaution reasons. Every webserver… well, most webservers, including OSNews, logs the IP in case you abuse the service. They can send a complain to a ISP better if they know which ISP the user used and what IP address he was using at that given time.

Makes life so much easier.

2. Retrieves music file data from the Internet, logging what songs it is retrieved for and who retrieved it.

Again, what they logged in is the IP address, and again as a precautionary meassure.

3. Acquires licenses automatically for protected content. Note that these ‘licenses’ may indeed cause files to be deleted on your system if terms of said ‘license’ do not agree with what Microsoft DRM thinks is legal/legitimate.

Still playing thos files on WMP (as mentioned above), still no license for my files. Strange. Wasn’t that suppose to happen? Man.

And I have just insert a CD and ripped the first song. No DRM. Just in WMA, but no DRM. Essentially the same with MP4 AAC, you can have DRM or no DRM.

4. Sends unique ID to content providers.

Only if you subscribe to that content provider.

5. Sends unique cookies to content providers.

Content provider’s servers gets bogged down by cookies – my problem? :-). If you are so afraid of cookies, you may as well leave this site which uses cookies

6. Sends undocumented player usage data to Microsoft.

The first question WMP asks you if you want to allow that to happen. It’s a opt-in thing.

7. Checks for updates in an undocumented fashion and then installs updates without telling the user what the updates are.

Heh? Man, I can’t remember the amount of times WMP notified me to install updates.

8. Downloads codecs not on the local machine keeping a remote usage log of what codecs you use and what files they are being used for.

Ohhh…. man…. I’m so scared. Now Microsoft knows I can watch DivX movies and listen to ogg music for years already! Oh man!

In case you didn’t know, MP3 requires a royalty. Why would Microsoft pay a royalty when they are trying to sell something in direct competition with it?

10. Installs undocumented DRM components on your computer for even non-Microsoft apps such as Mozilla. Does not support uninstalling DRM.

Like what? What DRM? Apparently, it was so well hidden, I also missed it. And I can still download MP3s from Mozilla, wonders!

11. Illegally copy-protects music that you own. If you copy music from a CD, the default operation is to copy protect those files thus making them unusable on another computer.

Moving the MP3s that I just played to my brothers computer. Still works fine. Whatever DRM it was, it sure didn’t do its job.

12. Individualizes all key components of the run-time client, making everything you do via WMP traceable to you.

The same goes to RealOne. Made by Microsoft? Man, I didn’t know. Now I have to use MusicMatch… oh, wait, the same thing! Oh, what about WinAMP? Is anything on Windows not inflicted with paranoia?!?!

13. Can change at any time. Given the legal disclaimers that are part of the licensing for WMP, essentially Microsoft can do whatever they want whenever they want. There is no telling what is actually going on because there is no binding contract with remedies that prevents Microsoft from dynamically changing the license terms.

The same arguement can be used for a lot of non-Microsoft software, but obviously, you never said a single thing about it. And what can be changed without any notice to consumers is the piracy policy – the same meassure is used in just about every site I regularly go to, including this one (via DoubleClick).

2003-05-26 8:25 am

“Sure, MS isn’t the most trustworthy, but Apple isn’t either.”

When did Apple gain a reputation for not being trustworthy? Perhaps YOU don’t trust them, but for comparisons sake, Microsoft is regarded as being far more untrustworthy than Apple…

In America we have a little policy known as innocent until proven guilty. Can anyone disprove that you work for Microsoft and that you’re just trying to spread FUD?

“Now, on to the math lesson. Apple sells individual songs (with some restrictions attached), for 99 cents a piece.”

Those “restrictions” are pretty lenient if you ask me. They allow you to make as many as 10 CDs with the music you downloaded. (Anyone burning more is likely in the business of distributing pirated CDs. Additionally, you can copy that song to three of your own computers. That sounds very reasonable considering the fact that few people have any more than three computers anyways. If you’re wanting to distribute it to a computer that is not yours… its important to remember that THAT IS ILLEGAL. These are the ONLY restrictions. If you have any problem with them its probably because you want to do illegal things with your music anyways. Consider the fact that we’re in this mess with these minor restrictions simply because of people that want to illegally distribute music.

“Okay, a typical cd nowadays has an average of 13 songs. If you pieced the cd together from Apple, it would cost $12.87”

“Shopping around at retail stores (not online), the average price (in my area anyway) is $13.95.”

“You save a whopping $1.08 .”

Yes, assuming you buy each song individually. The vast majority of songs on the iTunes Music store can also be had for a flat fee ranging in price between $9.99. Yes, even CDs that give you more than 10 songs! The savings increases exponentially.

“But, it’s only AAC, not the best format

Many might argue with that statement, but then I think you meant to say was that they were only 128 bit AAC… which as you say isn’t the best. However, most would probably argue that AAC offers the best sound quality at that bit rate.

“and only plays in a iPod.”

Wrong.

“The cd (with some exceptions), can be ripped perefectly into a plethora of codecs and used anywhere, at anytime, with no restrictions whatsoever.”

If you don’t mind the inconvience of having to make a trip to the store and ripping the music yourself, then go right ahead. Apple is selling convience with its music store.

“For the record, 99% of my cds come from the used cd store and generally cost $6 to $9. Do I need to do the math here?”

Then we don’t need you then….

2003-05-26 6:57 pm

quote: “Can anyone disprove that you work for Microsoft and that you’re just trying to spread FUD?”

Sorry to disappoint, I have no affiliation with MS other than having to use their OS on occasion. The main point is there are literally millions of people out there digging deep into every single thing MS does. Apple is currently a minor player and has a tendency to stay below the radar at the moment when it comes to security and privacy issues. The more they grow the more that may change. But can you “prove” that they don’t track their users? They’re in a very good position to do that, actually more so than MS as they control the hardware aspect as well as the software. I’m not spreading fud here, but trying to point out different possibilities. I would very much like to see some outside groups put Apple under the microscope on this issue and see what is discovered. You may be surprised.

Yes, the restrictions are very light, but they are restrictions nontheless.

Let me restate something else. The only “portable player” the itunes music will play in is an iPod. The first statement I made was’t properly made.

2003-05-26 8:52 pm

It’s relatively simple to sniff out what information a PC app is sending to remote sites. Spyware installed by a major vendor is usually noticed pretty quickly.